This episode is a little different to normal. I ran my first ever business retreat a couple of weeks ago now, and I recorded this episode with many thoughts and feelings very fresh in my mind. It’s more pondering in style than an episode that’s very structured. This is because I wanted to take the opportunity to speak out my thoughts, reflections and learnings and share these with you. So listen in to hear about where the idea came from, what I was most nervous about going into the event, how and why the workshops I designed and ran during the retreat were different to any I’d run before and what the outcome of the retreat was personally for me.

And if you’d like to be the first to know about my future events, join the waitlist here.

 

 

The Idea

So first of all, I want you to talk about the IDEA for business retreats. I’ve been on business retreats for the last two years in my business, thanks to Dani Hunt at Neverland Studio and The Brand Bazaar for bringing a group of women together to run these retreats. I met Dani really for the first time when I went to her retreat and I connected with so many amazing women through it.

The biggest thing I took away, apart from the relationships and connections (if fact you may have heard one of the other retreat attendees Alicia Rose Kruger on this podcast) was the way that it allowed me to see my business in a new light and hear their feedback, how they saw my business and their suggestions for where I could take it. And they actually spurred me on to share more and start this very podcast now. 

I think it’s quite important to have attended a retreat before you actually run when yourself. There are a lot of emotions that come up, there are different personality types, introverts and extroverts, there are different learning styles… It’s also helpful to get a feel of how to structure the days and the time needed for each session. And I learnt a lot from Dani, who so beautifully hosted us as a group and allowed us all to take time out if we needed to and take from it what we needed. 

Something that I’ve been practicing personally is, and this might sound a little bit weird, but it’s getting better at leaving my ego behind, not trying to be anyone else, and really stepping into just being me. 

And I guess that’s what I’m doing with this podcast and through my social media that definitely won’t be for some people – and they are not going to really connect with that. 

But by being more true to me, there will be some people who – hopefully-  really, really do connect with that. It’s me just being me and I’m not trying to be anyone else or feeling like I have to be something more or even to make myself bigger or make myself smaller – I’m still learning about that!

But this was my intention going into the retreat that I was just going to stand in my own shoes and that this would be enough. So I think that’s something really, really important. When you have an idea to run an event, is that you run it YOUR way.

 

 

Designing It

Before the weekend went ahead, I was already there at the retreat in my head. I’d basically been through it step by step in my mind thinking about, “right, we’re going to be here, what are we going to want after that? What are we going to need? What time might we need to allow?…”

That really, really helped because as we were there at the retreat, of course, things came up, but there were no big surprises I’d already been in my mind and stepped through it. I meant I could be very present and allow the weekend to unfold as it would be based on the women who were there. 

 

 

Going Into It

A few people asked if I felt nervous about running the event and if I was worried about people attending who weren’t the right fit.

This was actually the biggest reason I was quite nervous about going into the event. However, I have learned to lean into my brand and that’s what I say about actually just being YOU, not feeling like you have to be anything bigger or anything smaller; to show more of you through your marketing, through your social media, through your copy. 

Because when you do that, people are going to get a real sense for you and you are going to attract the people that 99% of the time (there’s always going to be a few people that maybe aren’t quite the right values fit), are going to be attracted to you and when they book in and attend your events, it’s going to be normally a pretty good fit. So trust yourself and believe in your brand, knowing that it’s going to attract the right people. 

Now, having said that, I was nervous going into the retreat and it wasn’t about the weather. That was always going to be interesting. Trentham really does embrace the four seasons in one day, which we really discovered over the weekend. I knew they’d be typos in the workbooks or pages out of order… but this wasn’t a big deal.

What I was nervous about was really the group of people and the energy, so let me explain that. I was nervous that someone might dominate the conversation. Someone would be a rambler, someone not have self-awareness of themselves in a group. Someone’s insecurity or lack of confidence in themselves might really impact the rest of the group, meaning we’d have to focus more on that one person. 

Now just by chance, and this wasn’t even planned by me, was that we every single attendee was from a different industry with a pretty different offering and different business model. However, each of the ladies brought the energy that I so, so was hoping for over the weekend. 

 

 

The Delivery

Going into this event, I realized that the three workshops that I would be running would be different to those I’ve run in the past, that have been basically three hours of communicating and giving information and allowing people some time to implement. 

But the delivery of the three workshops over the retreat was not me standing up and sharing information for three hours. When you’re at an earlier stage in your business, I believe that’s what you need. However, the ladies that attended this retreat and the way I positioned it and pitched it was at this stage in their business, they didn’t really need more information. What they needed was to start believing in a bolder vision of themselves to go to the next level. 

They needed space to be asked, maybe some triggering, some confronting questions to have someone give them permission to think bigger, to find more clarity, and I needed people to attend that didn’t need fixing. They had the foundations there for their business and now it was really about making sure that their business was operating the way that served them financially and in terms of what they actually love delivering. 

 

 

The Outcome

The outcome from the weekend was that for me, personally, it was the deepest expression of my work that I’ve delivered yet. Everything that the ladies took from it, I received in return. It was so fulfilling to be able to nurture and make the attendees hopefully feel really special; to trust himself to say “yes” to bigger opportunities; to allow themselves to be challenged; to  invest in themselves time-wise and financially; to walk away from the retreat having the start of a plan in place to be able to charge more, work less and do the things that they’re so skilled at based on their personality types; and for them to be able to show their own audience that they can perhaps dream a little bit bigger and play a bigger game… that really was magic.

I want to finish by saying a huge thank you to:

• Sandy and Rob Roy at Acre of Roses. They were my partners in crime when it came to running this event and allowed us to use their beautiful Rose farm in Trentham to host some of the workshops.

• Chloe Smith Photography who allowed us all to feel so comfortable getting our photos taken

• Sarah from The Botanist Wholefoods who provided us without beautiful food along with;

• Jochem at The Heartier for being our in house chef

• Anna at Casa Andante for your beautiful accommodation

And finally to the women who said “yes” to attending this retreat. I loved spending the weekend with you and I’m so very excited for where you take this now.

If you’d like to be the first to know about my future events, join the waitlist here.

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